It was hardest for me to leave the garret and the garden. In the
old houses the garret was the children's castle. The rough
rafters,--it was always ail unfinished room, otherwise not a true
garret,--the music of the rain on the roof, the worn sea-chests
with their miscellaneous treasures, the blue-roofed cradle that
had sheltered ten blue-eyed babies, the tape-looms and reels and
spinning wheels, the herby smells, and the delightful dream
corners,--these could not be taken with us to the new home.
Wonderful people had looked out upon us from under those garret-
eaves. Sindbad the Sailor and Baron Munchausen had sometimes
strayed in and told us their unbelievable stories; and we had
there made acquaintance with the great Caliph Haroun Alraschid.
To go away from the little garden was almost as bad. Its lilacs
and peonies were beautiful to me, and in a corner of it was one
tiny square of earth that I called my own, where I was at liberty
to pull up my pinks and lady's delights every day, to see whether
they had taken root, and where I could give my lazy morning-glory
seeds a poke, morning after morning, to help them get up and
begin their climb.
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